Give Back donations will support Maker Foundations, a flagship after-school program of the Digital Harbor Foundation (DHF). Over 14 weeks, middle and high school students learn a variety of Maker skills - coding, graphic design, 3D printing, electronics and more - and combine these skills to create their own capstone projects.

State government must now view cyber attacks that are more than cyber incidents. In this publication released April 7 by NASCIO, with support from the U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance, the following items are included to assist in preparation:

-A call to action for states to develop state cyber disruption response plans that include: a governance structure that clearly designates who is in charge in a given event or phase of an event; development of a risk profile for state assets; collaboration among the various agencies that have cyber responsibility; and a communication plan to ensure the right people have the right information as early as possible so they can respond effectively.

-A checklist for states to work with in developing progress toward a cyber disruption response operating discipline.

-A cross functional process description that can be used as a starting point for states to develop their own unique cross functional process for orchestrated planning and response at various threat levels.

This report released today by NASCIO, in partnership with the U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance, examines the subject of advanced cyber analytics and makes the case for states to invest in such capabilities and maintain ongoing maturity in advanced analytics.

All organizations, including state government, must also develop and maintain response capabilities that continuously mature in sophistication in order to keep pace with an ever changing threat landscape. State government remains in a defensive position. With the advent of multi-vector strategies by cyber criminals, state government now more than ever needs the ability to correlate disparate data sources generated from the myriad of security tools agencies have already invested in.

The report includes a call to action list, a checklist, key questions, and recommendations.

#StateITRocks in so many ways: collaborative projects, open government initiatives, constituent-focused apps and services, security and privacy and much more!

NASCIO is seeking nominations of transformational projects that address critical business problems, improve business processes and increase citizen engagement in state government. Nominate your state for the NASCIO State IT Recognition Awards.

The NASCIO State IT Recognition Awards honor outstanding technology achievements in state government. Learn about the 2015 award recipients through the spotlight series. Award submissions from 2001 to present can be found in the
awards library.

I recently attended the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) Global Summit in Washington, DC. Wow. Along with thousands of my newest privacy professional friends, I spent a couple of days listening to engaging sessions about various aspects of privacy and thinking big thoughts about data protection. Companies have been in the privacy game for a while now. Big companies have certified privacy professionals. Privacy in state government, while incredibly important, isn't as much of an evolved institution.

While at the summit, I got together with a couple of privacy professionals from state government, but it was literally just a handful. As far as we can gather, only four states have enterprise-level Chief Privacy Officers, while other states seem to have people working on privacy as part of their job or working on privacy at the agency level.

Here at NASCIO we see this issue emerging. We recently started the Privacy and Data Protection Working Group as a subcommittee of our Cybersecurity Committee and our first few calls have been very active with a lot of interest.

We are also planning an exciting panel on data protection with three of our nation's state CPOs at the
NASCIO Midyear Conference.

Want to get more involved in privacy? Ask me about joining the Privacy and Data Protection Working Group. Our next call is May 25. And in the mean time I hope to see you at Midyear!